Companion
by Enthusiastic Fish
Summary: Written for the NFA There It Sat challenge. Tim centered. Setting is the ocean north of Bermuda. Five chapters. Now complete.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** Written for the NFA There It Sat challenge. Tim-centered, slightly gruesome, but for me, this isn't even very angsty. Just a relatively short trip on the ocean...and who doesn't love that? ...besides Tim, of course.

**Disclaimer: **I do not now, nor have I ever owned NCIS. I am not making any money off this...more's the pity.

* * *

**Companion  
**by Enthusiastic Fish

There it sat, swaying gently back and forth as the waves rocked the small boat. Ignoring the corpse, it would have been a picture perfect setting: The sun nearing the horizon, casting reddening rays across the water, a cloudless sky, soft rocking. Perfect...except that the solitary living occupant of the lifeboat was currently feeding the fish what little was left in his stomach...and the boat was in the middle of the ocean...and his only companion was...well, a corpse.

Weakly, Tim sat back and stared at the dead body. It sat and stared back more blankly. He swallowed convulsively and tried not to think about the nauseating rhythm of the boat. He tried not to think about the fact that he was alone in the middle of the ocean with only a corpse for company. He tried not to think about how many fathoms deep the water must be at this point. He tried not to think about the ship that had sunk a few stormy hours before, taking with it, not only all his supplies, but the murderers and possibly even the rest of the NCIS team. He tried not to think about all that.

He failed.

Retching violently, Tim pulled himself over the side and heaved into the ocean once more. It really wasn't fair. Of all the people who should be stuck in a boat (yes, it was most definitely a boat and not a ship), Tim was the one who _really_ shouldn't be there. He sunk back to his seat and looked hopelessly at the oars. Where in the world would he row to? Then, his gaze fell to the bottom of the lifeboat. The water down there was red...bloody. Tim supposed he should be grateful that the harpoon hadn't punctured the boat itself after killing his erstwhile companion.

He looked at the dead body and felt little remorse. It was the dead man's fault he was here at all. One wrong turn as he had headed for the head at the height of the storm and suddenly, instead of heaving his guts out as he had planned, he was vomiting on the floor as he was dragged to the deck. Tim still had no idea how he had ended up in the lifeboat. He remembered trying to run on the reeling deck. A wave had crashed over the side, pulling him toward the edge. He had flailed...as had his captor. ...as had the man at the deck-mounted harpoon. Whether it had been fired on purpose or on accident, Tim didn't know, but suddenly, he and his captor had been flung into the lifeboat and another wave had carried it away...down down down to the water below.

The ocean waves had been so violent and the rain so heavy that Tim could barely see the ship, but the weather had cleared just for a moment...just long enough for Tim to watch the ship capsize and begin to sink beneath the waves. It seemed as though the universe had paused in that moment that Tim watched. There was no way that Gibbs and the rest of them had been able to get out, to get to the Coast Guard cutter that surely must be just out of sight. They must be dead. Tim's thoughts had been cut off fairly abruptly by a wave of water that rose up, like Poseidon emerging from the depths, and crashed over Tim with the force of a ton of bricks. It knocked his head rather soundly against the side of the boat and he was out.

When he had awakened, the cutter was nowhere in sight...nor was anything else. His stomach had promptly begun protesting its current location and now, even with all the food he had in his stomach feeding the fishes, he still felt like any injudicious movement on his part would result in another stretch of vomiting.

"This is all your fault," he said to the dead man.

The dead man didn't respond, but Tim thought that the face looked smug.

He sat up and looked around, hoping that maybe the view had changed. It hadn't. There was nothing to see, nowhere to go. He didn't even know where he was. When they had boarded the Coast Guard cutter, they were somewhere north of Bermuda...but now, Tim had no idea how long he'd been out and he didn't have a clue if he was closer to Bermuda or the US or the Bahamas...or Newfoundland. He just had no idea. If he was caught in the Gulf Stream...or the Antilles Current, he could be heading northward. That was a possibility. Panic began to rummage around in his head, trying to find a foothold.

_Are there sharks in the water around here?_

_Will anyone find me?_

_Is anyone left alive to find me?_

_Will I die of thirst or of hunger...or from a shark eating me?_

_Could I get hungry enough to eat...no...definitely not. I'll starve first._

Tim hoped there were no sharks, but as for the rest, he tried not to think about it. He tried really hard.

...but he failed.

As the sun set completely, bringing darkness to the world around him, Tim felt the unmistakable vestiges of fear taking root in his gut. He swallowed. Just before true night came on, he looked around once more...and he met the dead eyes of the corpse.

...and there the corpse sat.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

The stars overhead were beautiful. He had never seen so many at once, nor had he seen them with such clarity. There were no mountains, no buildings, nothing to block his view of the vaulting skies. Tim started to examine the constellations idly at first, as a way to distract himself both from his unsettled stomach and from his grisly companion. He started with the easiest, most recognizable constellations: Ursa Major, Pegasus, Scorpio, Sagittarius. Then, he moved on to the dimmer constellations like Camelopardalis. He smiled to himself as he picked out the dim stars that made up the modern constellation. They were even dimmer than Polaris which wasn't all that bright, for all that it marked the North Pole. That thought brought Tim up to a sitting position, staring at the dead man sitting across from him.

"Polaris! I can figure out my latitude at least!" It wasn't much, but it was something and it engaged his mind. Tim turned around on his seat, wanting to leap to his feet, but knowing that would be disastrous. There it was. Polaris hanging relatively low in the northern sky. Holding his fists out at arms' length, Tim used the rough measurement of a fist equaling ten degrees. _Ten...twenty...thirty..._ and half a fist. Thirty-five degrees, more or less. What was Bermuda's latitude? Tim couldn't remember, but he rather thought it was further south. If so, then he was drifting northward. He had no way of determining his longitude, but he knew that the Gulf Stream actually swirled around the East Coast before heading toward Europe. That wouldn't really help because if he were in the east part of the current, he wouldn't be anywhere near the coast.

Tim swore. He wasn't sure he liked knowing that he would eventually make it to Europe...especially since he'd be dead by the time he got there. Two dead bodies in a lifeboat. An hysterical chuckle escaped Tim's lips. Seeing as there was no one around, he let the laughter ring out for a while, but tears were hovering behind the laughter, as is so often the case. There was a part of him that just wanted to throw himself overboard and let the possibly-imagined sharks tear him to pieces. At least it would be quick...but he couldn't really do that. He knew it even as he wished for a quick end. It wouldn't be right to give up, even if things seemed hopeless...which they did. Letting himself die would be like admitting that there was nothing else to do but die...which might be the case, but that didn't really matter. Most people would fight even against inevitable death. That's what life was about, battling against the certainty of death. So, this would remain a lifeboat for as long as he could make it last.

He wasn't sure what he should do; so he leaned back, tried to find a comfortable position..._not_ touching the corpse. Then, he looked up at the sky again. He lulled himself to sleep counting the stars.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

The continuing seasickness roused him early in the morning. He awoke to a red sky as the sun rose. It was beautiful enough to distract even Tim from his nausea...until he remembered the silly little adage he'd learned as a child: _Red sky in the morning, sailor's warning._ This kind of a sky was supposed to herald an approaching storm. It no longer seemed silly. Now, it seemed dire and the beauty of the sky lessened a little bit.

"It's only a guideline...an old wives' tale," Tim said to his dead companion. "Right? There's no reason to think that I'm in danger of having to live through another storm...right?"

Obviously, his companion didn't respond.

"I mean, it could be anything. Even if there _are_ clouds coming in, I don't have to think that the storm is going to hit _me_. Right?"

The corpse sat mutely.

"Even if the...the storm...if there is one at all...even if it actually hits me...I don't think that I need to expect it to be as bad as the last one...right?" Tim swallowed and his head dropped. "Right...it could be hurricane instead."

Still, the corpse said nothing. Tim figured that he should be grateful for that. If the dead man started talking back, that would mean that either he had finally lost his mind or else that the world had gone screwy. He wasn't sure which one would be worse.

"At the risk of sounding like Tony," Tim had to stop for a moment as he remembered that Tony was likely dead, "I'm starting to act like Tom Hanks in _Cast Away_. I'm talking to an inanimate object. Although...technically, you only recently became that way. I suppose that doesn't really matter, does it? Why am I asking questions of a dead body?" Tim asked aloud. "Why did Tom Hanks start talking to a blood-stained football? Oh...wait, wasn't it a volleyball? He went crazy...but I'm not crazy. I've only been in this boat for a day...I think." Tim stopped talking as he realized he was talking to the corpse sitting across from him. It was incredibly easy to do. It got rid of the silence, distracted one's mind from unpleasant realities...like the fact that he was drifting aimlessly in a boat and would likely starve to death.

Maybe he should have watched more movies with Tony. He repeated the thought aloud. His companion didn't reply. Of course, he didn't. He was dead.

"You know, I never wanted to watch movies. I've never been a big movie person. I'm just not...but I could have done more with Tony. I could have laughed at more of his inane jokes. He's not necessarily dead...none of them are...but..." Tim blinked furiously for a few seconds. "...I have to admit the odds are pretty high."

The sun was rising higher and higher into the sky. It would be getting hotter. He would start feeling the need to drink water. Maybe by the time the storm got to him, he'd be thirsty enough that he wouldn't care about drowning.

"Do you think that Gibbs' boats actually float?"

The corpse didn't answer.

"I'm sure they do...I mean, they're made out of wood. Wood floats. This boat floats. If you were alive, would you even care that my friends are dead? ...if they are... Would you care at all? Probably not. You were willing to kill Lt. Cmdr. Booth just because he happened to stumble onto you guys when you were putting out to sea. You were going to kill me. Now, you're dead...and so is my team...my friends." Tim turned away from the body and looked out on the ocean, squinting in the glare of the bright sun, blinking back tears. He wished that he could leave a message to everyone...although, they might not be there to read it. He kept trying to qualify his statement, as if that would change the facts.

_I saw the ship go down. I didn't see anyone get off._ Those were cold hard facts, but they could be slightly ameliorated by the fact that the weather had been so bad he hadn't even been able to see the cutter...but... _Maybe the Gallatin sank, too._

Tim swallowed again and dropped his head into his hands. If he was going to have to die, he wished that he could have died with the team...not with the corpse of a man who had tried to kill him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

It was a very _very_ long day. By the time the sun finally dipped toward the western horizon, Tim was bored out of his mind...and he was hungry...and he was thirsty...and he was talking a lot more than he had been...to the corpse which was starting to look a little worse for the wear. Tim couldn't decide if he wanted to toss it out of the boat. For some reason, that idea revolted him...so he left the body where it was, staring blankly at him. Every time the silence descended, Tim found himself thinking about death, his own death, the death of the team. He couldn't handle it because every time he started thinking about it, he started to panic...so he didn't think about it. He talked to the corpse instead, thinking that he really wished he knew the dead man's name...but he drew the line at naming him Wilson.

"I love the Elements song. I memorized it. I know the whole thing. You want to hear it?" Tim sat up, cleared his throat and began to sing. "There's...antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium and hydrogen and oxygen and nitrogen and rhenium..." He still felt nauseous most of the time, but there was very little compulsion to actually retch anymore. Tim figured that his body had given up on that particular route for protest. He continued to sing and then, finally, he got to the end. "These are the only ones of which the news has come to Harvard, And there may be many others but they haven't been discovered." Tim nodded emphatically. "Did you know that there are eight named elements that have been discovered since Tom Lehrer wrote the song? I memorized those, too...because I'm a geek. Did you know that? There's Lawrencium, Rutherfordium, Dubnium, Seaborgium, Bohrium, Meitnerium, Hassium, Darmstadtium, and Roentgenium. There are also a few that don't have names yet."

Tim looked at the water. He was so thirsty. He knew, however, that drinking saltwater was a bad idea...but he really _really_ wanted to drink something. It was so hot.

"Water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink," he muttered. "Yeah, you can sit there silently. You don't need to drink anymore. You're dead. Dying like this is not my idea of a good time."

Actually, he suddenly realized that there was no sun. It hadn't set, but... Tim looked up at the sky...and saw clouds.

"Red sky in the morning, sailor's warning." Tim sighed. This day was just getting better and better. However... "Maybe it really will rain. I can drink rain. Even if I can't, I will." He began to harangue the sky, taunting every sky-related god he could think of including Zeus, Thor, Aether, Aeolus, Ashur, Ninlil. He didn't really think it would do any good, but at this point, he didn't really care. It kept him talking. When he finally ran out of insults (how many ways could one say that your mama was a raindrop...or some other such nonsense?), he looked back at the body.

"Well, I don't know why I did that. Oh, well." The silence descended and Tim felt the stirrings of panic. "I need to think of something else...something...else..." He looked around for inspiration. There wasn't much. Lots of water. He started to sing again, a song from his parents' time.

_"All day long I've faced the barren waste  
Without a taste of water...cool water.  
Ole Dan and I with throats burned dry  
And souls that cry  
For water...cool...clear...water."_

The clouds began to thicken. The sun disappeared completely and the temperature started to fall. Tim shivered, even though he'd been hot all day long.

"I think it might actually rain. What an idea. I can hold out until that comes up...or rather comes down." Tim nodded. He started to sing again...a different song.

_"I've been through the desert on a horse with no name  
It felt good to be out of the rain  
In the desert you can remember your name  
'Cause there ain't no one for to give you no pain  
La, la, la, la-a, la, la..."_

Tim did all the _la_s justice and sang them passionately. When he finished, he started to laugh.

"That has got to be the most grammatically incorrect lyric I've ever heard. 'Cause there ain't no one for to give you no pain'? What does that even _mean_?" The waves began to get higher and the small boat rocked more vigorously. Tim moaned as his stomach, which had never quite settled, began to register its intense dislike. The clouds were dark and menacing. Tim could have sworn that he could actually _see_ the line of the approaching storm. It looked to be as bad...or possibly worse, than the one that had sunk the killers' ship.

He stood up in the rocking boat without thinking, watching the line get closer and closer. This wasn't a hurricane, but in this pitiful boat, did that even matter? As he watched, he was suddenly treated to a view that was both amazing and terrifying. He'd heard of them, but never, _never_ had he actually seen one before.

"Oh..." There was no bravado. There was no reason for it. Tim was scared out of his mind as he watched a thin dark funnel reach down from the black clouds and stab into the ocean...a waterspout. A tornado at sea. It didn't matter that it was weak. He knew that waterspouts rarely became very large, but that didn't really matter. It was just another twist of the knife. He watched the phenomenon as it sucked water up into the sky, looking like a huge finger, like Zeus reaching down to stir up the ocean.

"I shouldn't have made fun of the gods, I guess," he said, trying not to panic. The waterspout didn't last very long. As the storm came closer and closer, it began to unravel. By the time the first raindrops fell, it was gone and Tim was left shivering in the boat as the skies opened up and fell down on him in torrents.

He did drink. He couldn't help but drink as he strove to bail the water that came into the boat both from the sky and from the waves that continually crashed over the sides, threatening to swamp him. The corpse was battered around and Tim paid it no attention. In that, he was definitely different from Tom Hanks. He couldn't care less about whether or not the corpse managed to stay in the boat. He focused on bailing. He focused so intently that when the large wave pounded against him, he was taken completely by surprise. Over the side he went, into the ocean. He swallowed seawater...and for the first time he gave into the blind panic that had threatened to overtake him during calmer times.

Tim struggled to the surface, fearing he'd never get there, fearing even more that the lifeboat, his only chance for surviving at all, would be gone. He floundered and splashed...and broke the surface, screaming. He spun himself around in circles...

...there was the boat, close to hand. He hadn't lost it although it was much lower in the water than he wanted to see. As he struggled to it, something brushed his leg. He screamed and sunk under the surface, momentarily paralyzed with fear. He came face to face with the corpse. Even though he had seen it for more than 24 hours, he still couldn't help but scream...and inhale water. Now, completely terrified, he shoved the body away from him and struggled to reach the open air again.

After what seemed an eternity, he felt the rain on his face and he coughed and choked, trying to expel the water he had taken in. The boat was further away than it had been. Tired, terrified, panicked, Tim forced himself to swim to the boat. With shaking hands, he grabbed the side. With weak arms he tried to pull himself back into the boat without capsizing it. It took two tries and the boat tilted alarmingly. Waves continued to beat against him, sometimes submerging him completely, sometimes simply blinding him with the stinging saltwater. There was so much water everywhere that he couldn't even tell how much was from the sky. Finally, he was back in the boat. He lay limply on the bottom until he realized that he'd have to start bailing again. Wearily, he knelt and began to try and keep the water line from rising. He knew that he didn't have a chance of actually emptying the little boat, but he could maybe, just maybe keep it from taking on too much water.

The storm went on and on, and Tim felt as though he'd die of exhaustion. He wondered why he was trying so hard to stay alive when there was no chance that he'd survive later. _I can't think this way,_ he thought to himself. He struggled to form a coherent sentence...but what came to his mind was a song...another song. Even in the midst of the agony, the tiredness, the hopelessness, it made him laugh. As he bailed, he started up a rhythm matching the song as he began to sing...or really, just mouth the words.

_"We came on the sloop John B  
My grandfather and me  
'Round Nas-sau town we did roam.  
Drinking all night,  
Had many a fight.  
Oh I feel so broke up  
I wanna go home._

_"So hoist up the John B. sails,  
And scrub down all of the rails  
Oh Captain please come aboard  
And sail me back home  
The sloop John B.  
Will sail the sea, for sure  
Next time without me  
I wanna go home."_

It was totally inappropriate to his situation, but he didn't care. He remembered listening to the Beach Boys when he was younger, laughing at the silly lyrics while washing the car or cleaning his room. It lightened his heart and gave him a little extra energy. He continued to sing and his words actually became slightly audible.

_"The first mate he got drunk,  
He broke open my trunk  
Poor seasick me all over the foam,  
Oceans are grand,  
Just give me the land  
I feel so broke up,  
I wanna go home._

_"So hoist up the John B. sails,  
And scrub down all of the rails  
Oh Captain please come aboard  
And sail me back home  
The sloop John B.  
Will sail the sea, for sure  
Next time without me  
I wanna go home."_

Myriad images flashed through his head from NCIS, from home, from anywhere in his life. He wasn't sure if that was what was meant by his life flashing before his eyes. He didn't _think _he was dying, although that would sure make things easier. Regardless, he continued to bail, continued to sing, thinking about his first day at NCIS, the people he'd met there, the things he'd learned...the people he'd miss so much if he did get rescued.

_"Our cook he got the fits  
He ate up all of my grits  
Into the soup he put his comb  
A terrible trip  
On a terrible ship, oh yeah  
I feel so broke up,  
I wanna go home._

_"So hoist up the John B. sails,  
And scrub down all of the rails  
Oh Captain please come aboard  
And sail me back home  
The sloop John B.  
Will sail the sea, for sure  
Next time without me  
I wanna go home."_

Tim bailed and bailed and hardly noticed when the storm began to lessen. Then, it was raining, drizzling and Tim looked blearily around, seeing that the waves were calmer, that the sun had set at some point during his battle with the elements. Weary beyond belief, Tim brought his soaking wet shirt up to his mouth and began to suck the water from it. It was slightly salty, but he hoped that it wasn't going to make things worse. He was so thirsty, even after all the water he'd already swallowed that he pulled off his shirt and began to suck at it, shoving wads of fabric into his mouth and sucking every bit of moisture from it in a desperate attempt not to waste anything.

The rain continued to fall lightly, soaking him to the skin, making him shiver both from the adrenaline and from the cold. His shirt got soaked again...and again, he sucked it dry. He pulled off his shoes, empty the water from them and set them out on the little bench, hoping that they might catch some water before the rain stopped.

Maybe it was because of his earlier thoughts about sharks, but Tim suddenly had another song in his head. He was so tired and he wanted to sleep, but he was afraid that if he did, he'd die of hypothermia. He was freezing. He was wet...and he had no idea how long it had been since the sun had set. Even though he wanted nothing more than to let himself fall into oblivion, he sat on the bottom of the boat, drew his knees to his chest and began to sing once more, his voice cracked and weak.

_"Show me the way to go home  
I'm tired and I want to go to bed  
I had a little drink about an hour ago  
And it went right to my head  
Where ever I may roam  
On land or sea or foam  
You will always hear me singing this song  
Show me the way to go home."_

Then, Tim began to cry. Through his tears he sang the little ditty again.

_"Show me the way to go home  
I'm tired and I want to go to bed  
I had a little drink about an hour ago  
And it went right to my head  
Where ever I may roam  
On land or sea or foam  
You will always hear me singing this song  
Show me the way to go home."_

All through the long cold night, Tim repeated the lyrics, occasionally stopping to take off his shirt and suck the water from it as the rain continued to fall. He wondered if he would be able to survive it.

In his misery, he didn't even notice the missing corpse.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

Tim awoke shaking violently. He wasn't sure when he had fallen asleep, but he didn't really feel rested. He just felt cold. His arms were wedged tightly under his armpits as he tried to get warm. He looked toward the east and saw that the sun was already up, although lingering clouds kept it from warming the air as much as Tim wanted it to. He picked up one of his shoes. It was not _full_, but it had some water in it. He drank it. The water tasted awful, but Tim didn't care. Tim didn't care about much at that point. He didn't bother to look around. He didn't even think much. All he did was sit and shiver.

He rocked back and forth in rhythm with the boat, barely noticing the spray of the water as it hit his face. For the moment, he was essentially empty, just a living being with no mind nor will.

After uncounted hours, the sun broke through the clouds and shone directly on his face. Tim squinted up into the light. The sun was already past zenith, but the clouds looked to be finally departing to the west to torment people elsewhere. Tim smiled a little at the thought. As much as he'd been annoyed by the sun the day before (was it only a day?), now, he basked in the heat it cast down on his shivering body. He roused enough to realize that his traveling companion was gone. In its place was...his shoes, one empty, one still containing a little bit of water.

"Oh...parting is such sweet sorrow," he said sarcastically. He looked around, wondering if it was there somewhere, hovering just beneath the surface...like the Inferi in the _Half-Blood Prince_, lurking beneath the surface of the lake waiting to... That was not a pleasant thought. He pushed it away and looked at the shoes again.

"I might as well drink it now as later," Tim said aloud and reached for it with a hand that shook with more than cold. He had taxed his reserves during the storm and there was nothing to restore them. He looked into his shoe at the water and knew that it would more than likely taste even worse than the water in the first shoe...but that didn't matter a whole lot because he was thirsty and unless another storm came up, he wasn't likely to get anymore. He drank it and shuddered as his stomach turned, but he managed to keep it down.

"So...now, I'm reduced to talking to myself rather than a dead body. Which is worse?" Tim asked. "I guess as long as I don't start answering myself...or expecting responses, I should be fine." He shifted his body slightly so that as much of it was facing the sun directly as possible. He couldn't think of anything to say and all the thoughts he had managed to avoid up to that point came flooding in.

"They're all dead. They must be. I didn't imagine the ship sinking. Maybe I could have blinked and missed it...I don't think so. And if they're all dead, then no one will know that I'm out here...will they...which means...I'm going to die...slowly...miserably...and...all alone, not even a corpse for company." His head dropped to his knees and silent tears dripped onto his torn pants. "I never thought I'd miss seeing a dead body." He hiccuped...a choked laugh. "I'm really pitiful."

As the sun slowly sank toward the western horizon, Tim's spirits fell with it. By the time the brilliant red sunset cast long rays over Tim and the lifeboat, he was back to a lifeless lump, huddled in the bottom of the boat, absently wondering if he'd survive another night, but not thinking much beyond that...not even sure if he _wanted_ to survive another night.

Night came again, the sun departing for the nether regions, the stars beginning to twinkle overhead. Tim didn't see them. He didn't look up. He began to shiver again, never having warmed up completely. He began to slip further down into the boat until he was curled in a fetal position, arms wrapped tightly around his body as he shivered, just waiting for the end that really did seem inevitable.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

Light shone through Tim's eyelids, waking him up in the blackness of the night. He opened his eyes and promptly closed them again. The light was so bright! It couldn't be the moon. They were on the new moon phase...unless he'd managed to sleep for two weeks without dying...even then...

Still shaking violently, Tim sat up. It was black all around, except for the search light that shone in his face and blinded him to anything else. His mind was slow to pick up on what that meant.

"_Ahoy, the boat!"_

Tim tried to shade the light from his face as he tried to figure out what was going on.

"_You alive there?"_

"Yes?" Tim asked, too softly to be heard. He actually wasn't sure of the answer.

"_Probie!"_

"_McGee!"_

Tim registered his name, but he didn't register the voices.

"_He's off the starboard side...er...port! Port side!"_

"_DiNozzo!"_

"_Port! It's port!"_

"_It's him! McGee!"_

A thought, an impossible thought, began to niggle its way into Tim's consciousness. _Tony? Ziva? Gibbs? They're alive?_ He couldn't bring himself to believe it, to believe something he'd convinced himself was impossible.

"_Move that stupid light down! He can't see anything!"_

The light shifted down into the boat. Tim blinked a few times and saw...a cutter, a Coast Guard cutter...a ship. Tim stared dazedly at it, still not quite able to believe it was really there.

"_McGee!"_

There were figures on the deck, waving frantically at him. Tim just sat there...shaking.

"_We're coming to get you, McGee!"_

He saw a flurry of activity as three figures tried to get in a boat before it was lowered down to the waves. They didn't succeed and the boat settled in the water and motored over to him. They were all strangers...but slightly familiar.

"Agent McGee, how are you feeling?"

Tim thought about that and tried to answer, but he couldn't seem to get the words out. One of the men climbed over to the boat and helped him get out of his lifeboat.

"P-P-Permission t-to c-come aboard?" Tim asked, finally able to think of something to say.

The man grinned. "Permission most heartily granted, Agent McGee. We've been looking for you for three days." He put a thermal blanket around Tim's shoulders as the other man began to steer the boat back to the cutter.

"Is th-th-this the...G-Gallatin?"

"Indeed it is and happy to have you back aboard, sir."

"Sh-She didn't s-s-sink?" Tim asked in shock.

"It takes more than a little storm to put us under...looks like the same goes for you as well."

As the Gallatin loomed high above him, Tim didn't answer. He looked at it with a growing sense of relief. It was really there. It wasn't going to disappear. He wasn't going to wake up and have it all be a dream.

"Oh...please, l-l-let this n-not be a d-d-dream," Tim whispered.

The man helped Tim stand to get back aboard. "You're not dreaming, Agent McGee. Welcome aboard the USCGC Gallatin."

With that, Tim sighed...and sagged...and before his rescuer could say anything else, Tim fell to the decking, unconscious.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

"_Ah...Bermuda!" Tony said gleefully. "I love Bermuda!"_

"_Tony, is there any island that you do _not_ like?" Ziva asked sarcastically._

"_Sure."_

"_Like what?" Tim asked._

"_The Falkland Islands. Way too close to the South Pole for my tastes. Greenland. Baffin Island."_

_The others chuckled._

"_Why can't we come to these islands on vacation? Why do we always have to be pursuing criminals?"_

"_You want a vacation in the tropics, DiNozzo? Pay for it yourself," Gibbs said as he strode past him. "We're here on the job. Don't think I don't know what you were doing in Puerto Rico."_

"_That was years ago, Boss! I've matured since then."_

_Tim snorted._

"_Got something to say, Probie?"_

"_I don't think I need to, Tony," Tim said, grinning._

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"_What is these men are alleged to have done?"_

"_Killed a Navy lieutenant who discovered their drug dealing at Norfolk."_

"_Oh. Yeah, I saw them. They were down in the marina, looking to get a boat."_

"_Which marina?"_

"_King's Wharf."_

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"_Did Probie-san forget to take his Dramamine?" Tony asked maliciously._

_Tim swallowed as the cutter plowed through the waves. He was definitely looking green around the gills and Tony was enjoying it._

"_There's a storm heading this way, Agent Gibbs," the captain reported. "It doesn't look too bad at the moment, but these things can worsen suddenly. We may have to stop and ride it out."_

"_Understood. We gaining on them at all?"_

"_Some." The captain saw Tim's face and grinned a little. "We're at max speed right now. We'll catch them, but it could take a while."_

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"_There she is! Looks abandoned!"_

"_We're going aboard."_

"_Your man going to make it? He looks a bit unsteady, and it's pretty choppy as it is." _

_Choppy was an understatement. The storm was bad and the killers' ship rode pretty high._

"_He's tough. He can make it," Gibbs said. _

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"_Boss..." Tim began, looking distinctly ill._

"_McGee," Gibbs said with resignation. Sometimes, it was a real trial have someone who got seasick on the team._

"_Sorry, Boss," Tim said, whirled around and ran for the head. They had passed it just a few minutes ago as they cleared belowdeck._

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

_The ship tilted alarmingly. "Whoa! What was that?" Tony asked._

"_Where is McGee?" Ziva asked._

"_The head."_

"_We should get off the ship. No one is here. They must have met up with their partners and escaped."_

_Tony was about to reply when the three of them were tossed against the wall._

"_She's capsizing!" Gibbs shouted. "Run!"_

_Reeling like drunken sailors, they ran topside as the ship righted itself._

"_Where's McGee?" Tony shouted. The storm seemed to have grown threefold in the short time they had been below._

"_Look! There!" Ziva shouted, pointing at a shuddering figure on the deck. They ran and turned the man over. It was not Tim._

"_Egner!" Gibbs shouted. The ship tilted again. "Where's my agent?"_

_Egner didn't answer and Gibbs picked him up and threw him against the side of the cabin._

"_Where is he?"_

_Egner looked terrified. He wasn't a sailor. "Overboard! A wave took them and the lifeboat overboard!"_

_Tony and Ziva started to run for the side, but then, the ship began to fall, seemingly in slow motion toward the ocean. They looked at Gibbs. He looked out at the ocean, trying to find Tim, but the rain and waves obscured everything beyond the deck. They could barely see the Gallatin from there._

"_Jump!"_

"_What about McGee?"_

"_We'll find him! Jump!"_

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"What are the odds, Boss?" Tony's whispered voice asked.

"The odds of what, DiNozzo?" Gibbs asked but knowing what he meant.

"Us finding him...before he died."

"Not high," Ziva said. "I am sure that McGee could tell you."

"More than likely," Gibbs said, smiling a little. They were in the medical facility, staring at Tim as he slept. It had been a couple of hours, but they had just waited while Gallatin made best speed for Bermuda. During the chase that had led them into the first storm, they had ended up 100 miles northwest of the islands. Tim had drifted or been blown another 100 miles in the second storm and then with the current he had been in. It wasn't quite in the Gulf Stream, but it was close enough that he'd been carried northward. He was badly sunburned on his face and arms and neck, and he was bruised over pretty much the rest of his body...in addition to the large bruise that graced his forehead.

It had been such a relief when they found the boat, although there was a moment when they had panicked. Tim had been lying so still in the bottom. They hadn't felt much better when he sat up and stared around, not seeming to even recognize them.

"He's going to be all right," the medic said. "We've got him on a saline drip to counteract the dehydration, and the only reason we're doing that is because he's unconscious...but that's not too serious either. We'll get him checked out more thoroughly in Hamilton, but he's going to be fine."

"Thank you, but we will stay," Ziva said.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"_You should have stayed in the boat," the corpse said, grinning. "You're drowning. There's no ship. It was all a dream."_

Tim mumbled and shifted. Gibbs sat up. They'd all drifted off, waiting. It was a few hours back to Bermuda, and they hadn't really slept all that much during the search. He was on the verge of waking up, it seemed...and whatever he was dreaming wasn't particularly pleasant.

"_You're going to die...all alone. You can join me at the bottom of the sea!"_

"No!" Tim sat up, shouting, "No!" and gasping for air. Immediately, Gibbs was beside him, pushing him back down.

"Calm down, McGee," Gibbs said. Tim looked up at him, not seeing him for a moment, tears blurring his eyes. Then, before Gibbs could do anything else, Tim looked at his boss and wrapped his arms around his waist, like a child hugging a parent. Gibbs almost started laughing, but the fear on Tim's face was too serious to laugh at.

"You're alive! You're alive!" Tim started to cry. "I saw...I saw the ship go down...I didn't...see you get away. I thought...you had all drowned. I thought you were dead...all I had was the body and..."

Tim didn't seem care about the fact that he was hugging Gibbs. No doubt it would be embarrassing later, but right now, he didn't care. His only care was that his friends were alive. He repeated the words over and over again, as if to make sure that they were really true.

_Body?_ Gibbs sat down beside Tim on the bed, keeping his hands firmly on Tim's shoulders. "What body, McGee?"

"One of the guys we were chasing. Not Egner, but the other one. He got shot...with a harpoon."

"What?"

Tim sat back, still shaking a little. He wiped away the tears and explained. "I'm not sure where they were hiding, but Egner was on the deck when I got there. He dragged me up and I was..." Tim flushed and swallowed. "...throwing up too much to stop him."

Gibbs just smiled, too glad that Tim was okay to worry about seasickness.

"Either Egner was aiming at me and missed or else he fired it accidentally, but the harpoon killed the other guy. We both landed in the lifeboat..." Tim shivered in recollection. "I looked and looked for you guys, but...I couldn't see anything except the ship sinking and then, I got knocked out and when I woke up, there was nothing...nothing except the corpse in the boat. I was sure you guys must be dead..."

"We're not dead, McGee. Promise. How are you feeling?"

Tim sniffled and laughed. "Terrible."

Gibbs chuckled. "I can believe that."

"Probie!"

Tim barely had time to shift position before his back was being thumped much too heartily by Tony. Ziva, shifting smoothly from asleep to awake, sat at the end of the bed and patted his leg much more calmly, but she too looked overjoyed to see Tim awake and alive.

"It is good to see you, McGee."

Tim tried to wipe away the tears, but they kept getting replaced by more...Tony wasn't helping, Gibbs could tell, but Tim also seemed to be so happy that they were all alive...

"They kept trying to say that you were a goner, but we all knew that you'd stay alive just to buck the trend," Tony said, extremely happily.

"Tony...you're giving me whiplash," Tim said through his tears.

"Sorry, Probie. We're just glad to have you back alive."

Suddenly, Tim's eyes were haunted. "I couldn't see any way out of it...not when I was in the boat," he whispered and shivered a little. "The Atlanic is over 45 million square miles of ocean. Even if you cut it down to just the area I was...drifting in...that's..." Tim stopped and seemed to realize that he was babbling.

"...and I thought you were dead. I thought that, even if by some miracle, you had gotten out alive, there was so much empty space. Just me drifting in the water." Tim's voice was shaky, but no one interrupted, not even Tony. "I was hungry. I was thirsty. I was sharing a boat with a corpse." He laughed briefly. "Then...that second storm...I wasn't sure if I could make it. I got...knocked out of the boat, and...I almost drowned...and...I wasn't even sure if I _wanted_ to make it by that time. There's..." Tim closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Tony grabbed his shoulder in support, but he still didn't speak. It seemed more important to let Tim get this all out at once. "The only thing I could see coming was a slow, miserable death, all alone..." He laughed again, but rarely had his laughter sounded more hollow. "...I didn't even have the corpse anymore. It got washed away during the...the storm. I was so tired. I was sucking water out of my shirt while it was raining, just so that I could...drink something. Then, I was so cold. I didn't have anything left. The storm took too much away. I'd given up. It was easier than trying to hope. Hope took too much energy." He shivered again.

In a gesture that he knew was extremely paternal, Gibbs pulled the blanket up around Tim's shoulders and stood. "You need anything?"

"A bath, water, food...dramamine," Tim said, smiling a little.

"I would have thought that all your time at sea would have cured your seasickness," Ziva commented.

"No...I was sick the entire time."

Ziva smiled sympathetically. "I will see if they have some dramamine."

"I'll check with the medic and go to the mess," Gibbs said.

"Water's right here," Tony said and handed Tim a bottle.

Tim grabbed it and chugged it down, causing Ziva to pause before she left.

"Slow down, McGee," Ziva said and pulled down the bottle. "There is plenty more."

Tim nodded and tried to drink more calmly, but all too soon, the bottle was empty. Tony just grinned and held out another one. "Drink away, Probie."

Ziva rolled her eyes and left as Tim downed another bottle of water...more slowly this time.

Within an hour, Tim was sated, both body and spirit...and his stomach was calmed. With the team around him, he fell asleep again, allowing his body to heal from its recent abuses.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"_You're going to die...you're all alone..."_

Tim opened his eyes in a panic and sat up in bed, panting. For a moment, all he could see around him was the open ocean, just the neverending expanse of water...but then, his vision cleared. He was in the hospital in Hamilton. He had been admitted overnight, just as a precaution. Tomorrow, they'd be heading back to NCIS, suspect in hand, the same four who had left. Tim looked around the room. Gibbs was asleep in a chair next to the bed, his head tilted backwards. Tony's head was pillowed in his arms as he slept, slumped over the bedside table. Ziva was in much the same position, only her head was on the foot of the bed.

Tim smiled at the sight of them all there. It brought a lump to his throat...and it made him feel safe again. While he sat there, basking in the comfort of their presence, Ziva opened her eyes. His movement had disturbed her.

"McGee, are you all right?" she asked, whispering to keep from disturbing the others.

"Yeah, Ziva. I am. Thanks."

She smiled. "I was afraid that you would be lost forever...or worse, that we would find you just barely too late. I am not sure which would be worse."

"Neither am I."

Hesitantly, Tim held out his hand. Ziva scooted closer and took it in her own. They sat silently and then, Tim leaned back in bed and Ziva returned to her former position. They both slept.

x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x

"So...Probie, how do you feel about sailing now?" Tony asked, smiling widely as they prepared to board the plane.

"It's not fit for polite company, Tony!" Tim called over the roar of the engines.

"You weren't sailing, McGee! You were floating," Gibbs shouted over his shoulder. "You need a _sail_ in order to go sailing!"

"I'll keep that in mind, Boss!"

When they were all comfortably settled in their seats, Tim leaned back. He wasn't fully recovered yet, but a few more days' rest would see him back to normal. He looked out the window as they flew over the Atlantic...and a song came into his head – the same song he'd been singing so hopelessly a day ago. He sang it very softly.

"_Show me the way to go home  
__I'm tired and I want to go to bed  
__I had a little drink about an hour ago  
__And it went right to my head  
__Where ever I may roam  
__On land or sea or foam  
__You will always hear me singing this song  
__Show me the way to go home."_

When he finished, he looked back and saw Gibbs staring at him. He smiled and shrugged, slightly embarrassed.

Gibbs pointed. "Home is that way, McGee."

"Yeah, Boss. I know." _I'm going home._

FINIS!


End file.
